1 These are the words that Moses spoke to all Israel across the Jordan in the wilderness, in the Arabah opposite Suph, between Paran and Tophel, Laban, Hazeroth, and Dizahab. 2 It is eleven days’ journey from Horeb by way of Mount Seir to Kadesh-barnea. 3 In the fortieth year, on the first day of the eleventh month, Moses spoke to the sons of Israel, in accordance with everything that the Lord had commanded him to declare to them, 4 after he had defeated Sihon the king of the Amorites, who lived in Heshbon, and Og the king of Bashan, who lived in Ashtaroth and in Edrei. 5 Across the Jordan in the land of Moab, Moses began to explain this Law, saying,
6 “The Lord our God spoke to us at Horeb, saying, ‘You have stayed long enough at this mountain. 7 Turn and set out on your journey, and go to the hill country of the Amorites, and to all their neighbors in the Arabah, in the hill country, in the lowland, in the Negev, by the seacoast, the land of the Canaanites, and Lebanon, as far as the great river, the river Euphrates. 8 See, I have placed the land before you; go in and take possession of the land which the Lord swore to give to your fathers, to Abraham, to Isaac, and to Jacob, and their descendants after them.’
9 “And I spoke to you at that time, saying, ‘I am not able to endure you alone. 10 The Lord your God has multiplied you, and behold, you are this day like the stars of heaven in number. 11 May the Lord, the God of your fathers increase you a thousand times more than you are, and bless you, just as He has promised you! 12 How can I alone endure the burden and weight of you and your strife? 13 Obtain for yourselves men who are wise, discerning, and informed from your tribes, and I will appoint them as your heads.’ 14 And you answered me and said, ‘The thing which you have said to do is good.’ 15 So I took the heads of your tribes, wise and informed men, and appointed them as heads over you, commanders of thousands, hundreds, fifties, and tens, and officers for your tribes.
16 “Then I ordered your judges at that time, saying, ‘Hear the cases between your fellow countrymen and judge righteously between a person and his fellow countryman, or the stranger who is with him. 17 You are not to show partiality in judgment; you shall hear the small and the great alike. You are not to be afraid of any person, for the judgment is God’s. The case that is too difficult for you, you shall bring to me, and I will hear it.’ 18 At that time I commanded you all the things that you were to do.
19 “Then we set out from Horeb, and went through all that great and terrible wilderness that you saw on the way to the hill country of the Amorites, just as the Lord our God had commanded us; and we came to Kadesh-barnea. 20 And I said to you, ‘You have come to the hill country of the Amorites, which the Lord our God is about to give us. 21 See, the Lord your God has placed the land before you; go up, take possession, just as the Lord, the God of your fathers, has spoken to you. Do not fear or be dismayed.’
22 “Then all of you approached me and said, ‘Let us send men ahead of us, so that they may spy out the land for us, and bring back to us word of the way by which we should go up, and the cities which we should enter.’ 23 The plan pleased me, and I took twelve of your men, one man for each tribe. 24 Then they turned and went up into the hill country, and came to the Valley of Eshcol, and spied it out. 25 And they took some of the fruit of the land in their hands and brought it down to us. They also brought us back a report and said, ‘The land that the Lord our God is about to give us is good.’
26 “Yet you were unwilling to go up; instead you rebelled against the command of the Lord your God; 27 and you grumbled in your tents and said, ‘Because the Lord hates us, He has brought us out of the land of Egypt, to hand us over to the Amorites to destroy us. 28 Where can we go up? Our brothers have made our hearts melt, by saying, “The people are bigger and taller than we; the cities are large and fortified up to heaven. And besides, we saw the sons of the Anakim there.”’ 29 But I said to you, ‘Do not be terrified, nor fear them. 30 The Lord your God, who goes before you, will Himself fight for you, just as He did for you in Egypt before your eyes, 31 and in the wilderness where you saw how the Lord your God carried you, just as a man carries his son, on all of the road which you have walked until you came to this place.’ 32 Yet in spite of all this, you did not trust the Lord your God, 33 who goes before you on your way, to seek out a place for you to make camp, in the fire by night to show you the way by which you should go, and in the cloud by day.
34 “Then the Lord heard the sound of your words, and He was angry and swore an oath, saying, 35 ‘Not one of these men, this evil generation, shall see the good land which I swore to give your fathers, 36 except Caleb the son of Jephunneh; he shall see it, and to him I will give the land on which he has set foot, and to his sons, because he has followed the Lord fully.’ 37 The Lord was angry with me also on your account, saying, ‘Not even you shall enter there. 38 Joshua the son of Nun, who stands before you, shall himself enter there; encourage him, for he will give it to Israel as an inheritance. 39 Moreover, your little ones who, you said, would become plunder, and your sons, who this day have no knowledge of good and evil, shall enter there, and I will give it to them and they shall take possession of it. 40 But as for you, turn around and set out for the wilderness by the way of the Red Sea.’
41 “Then you replied to me, ‘We have sinned against the Lord; we ourselves will go up and fight, just as the Lord our God commanded us.’ And every man of you strapped on his weapons of war, and you viewed it as easy to go up into the hill country. 42 But the Lord said to me, ‘Say to them, “Do not go up nor fight, for I am not among you; otherwise you will be defeated by your enemies.”’ 43 So I spoke to you, but you would not listen. Instead, you rebelled against the command of the Lord, and acted presumptuously and went up into the hill country. 44 And the Amorites who lived in that hill country came out against you and chased you as bees do, and they scattered you from Seir to Hormah. 45 Then you returned and wept before the Lord; but the Lord did not listen to your voice, nor pay attention to you. 46 So you remained at Kadesh for many days, the days that you spent there.
1 Sing for joy to God our strength;
Shout joyfully to the God of Jacob.
2 Raise a song, strike the tambourine,
The sweet sounding lyre with the harp.
3 Blow the trumpet at the new moon,
At the full moon, on our feast day.
4 For it is a statute for Israel,
An ordinance of the God of Jacob.
5 He established it as a testimony in Joseph
When he went throughout the land of Egypt.
I heard a language I did not know:
6 “I relieved his shoulder of the burden,
His hands were freed from the basket.
7 You called in trouble and I rescued you;
I answered you in the hiding place of thunder;
I put you to the test at the waters of Meribah. Selah
8 Hear, My people, and I will admonish you;
Israel, if you would listen to Me!
9 There shall be no strange god among you;
Nor shall you worship a foreign god.
10 I, the Lord, am your God,
Who brought you up from the land of Egypt;
Open your mouth wide and I will fill it.
11 “But My people did not listen to My voice,
And Israel did not obey Me.
12 So I gave them over to the stubbornness of their heart,
To walk by their own plans.
13 Oh that My people would listen to Me,
That Israel would walk in My ways!
14 I would quickly subdue their enemies
And turn My hand against their adversaries.
15 Those who hate the Lord would pretend to obey Him,
And their time of punishment would be forever.
16 But I would feed you with the finest of the wheat,
And with honey from the rock I would satisfy you.”
1 God takes His position in His assembly;
He judges in the midst of the gods.
2 How long will you judge unjustly
And show partiality to the wicked? Selah
3 Vindicate the weak and fatherless;
Do justice to the afflicted and destitute.
4 Rescue the weak and needy;
Save them from the hand of the wicked.
5 They do not know nor do they understand;
They walk around in darkness;
All the foundations of the earth are shaken.
6 I said, “You are gods,
And all of you are sons of the Most High.
7 Nevertheless you will die like men,
And fall like one of the princes.”
8 Arise, God, judge the earth!
For You possess all the nations.
1 Woe, Ariel, Ariel the city where David once camped!
Add year to year, keep your feasts on schedule.
2 I will bring distress to Ariel,
And she will be a city of grieving and mourning;
And she will be like an Ariel to me.
3 I will camp against you encircling you,
And I will set up siegeworks against you,
And I will raise up battle towers against you.
4 Then you will be brought low;
From the earth you will speak,
And from the dust where you are prostrate
Your words will come.
Your voice will also be like that of a spirit from the ground,
And your speech will whisper from the dust.
5 But the multitude of your enemies will become like fine dust,
And the multitude of the ruthless ones like the chaff which blows away;
And it will happen instantly, suddenly.
6 From the Lord of armies you will be punished with thunder and earthquake and loud noise,
With whirlwind and tempest and the flame of a consuming fire.
7 And the multitude of all the nations who wage war against Ariel,
Even all who wage war against her and her stronghold, and who distress her,
Will be like a dream, a vision of the night.
8 It will be as when a hungry person dreams—
And behold, he is eating;
But when he awakens, his hunger is not satisfied,
Or as when a thirsty person dreams—
And behold, he is drinking,
But when he awakens, behold, he is faint
And his thirst is not quenched.
So will the multitude of all the nations be
Who wage war against Mount Zion.
9 Be delayed and horrified,
Blind yourselves and be blind;
They become drunk, but not with wine,
They stagger, but not with intoxicating drink.
10 For the Lord has poured over you a spirit of deep sleep,
He has shut your eyes—the prophets;
And He has covered your heads—the seers.
11 The entire vision will be to you like the words of a sealed book, which, when they give it to the one who is literate, saying, “Please read this,” he will say, “I cannot, because it is sealed.” 12 Then the book will be given to the one who is illiterate, saying, “Please read this.” And he will say, “I cannot read.”
13 Then the Lord said,
“Because this people approaches Me with their words
And honors Me with their lips,
But their heart is far away from Me,
And their reverence for Me consists of the commandment of men that is taught;
14 Therefore behold, I will once again deal marvelously with this people, wondrously marvelous;
And the wisdom of their wise men will perish,
And the understanding of their men who have understanding will be concealed.”
15 Woe to those who deeply hide their plans from the Lord,
And whose deeds are done in a dark place,
And they say, “Who sees us?” or “Who knows us?”
16 You turn things around!
Shall the potter be considered as equal with the clay,
That what is made would say to its maker, “He did not make me”;
Or what is formed say to him who formed it, “He has no understanding”?
17 Is it not yet just a little while
Before Lebanon will be turned into a fertile field,
And the fertile field will be considered as a forest?
18 On that day those who are deaf will hear words of a book,
And out of their gloom and darkness the eyes of those who are blind will see.
19 The afflicted also will increase their joy in the Lord,
And the needy of mankind will rejoice in the Holy One of Israel.
20 For the ruthless will come to an end and the scorner will be finished,
Indeed all who are intent on doing evil will be eliminated,
21 Who cause a person to be indicted by a word,
And set a trap for the arbitrator at the gate,
And defraud the one in the right with meaningless arguments.
22 Therefore this is what the Lord, who redeemed Abraham, says concerning the house of Jacob:
“Jacob will not be ashamed now, nor will his face turn pale now;
23 But when he sees his children, the work of My hands, in his midst,
They will sanctify My name;
Indeed, they will sanctify the Holy One of Jacob,
And will stand in awe of the God of Israel.
24 Those who err in mind will know the truth,
And those who criticize will accept instruction.
1 The elder to the beloved Gaius, whom I love in truth.
2 Beloved, I pray that in all respects you may prosper and be in good health, just as your soul prospers. 3 For I was overjoyed when brothers came and testified to your truth, that is, how you are walking in truth. 4 I have no greater joy than this, to hear of my children walking in the truth.
5 Beloved, you are acting faithfully in whatever you accomplish for the brothers and sisters, and especially when they are strangers; 6 and they have testified to your love before the church. You will do well to send them on their way in a manner worthy of God. 7 For they went out for the sake of the Name, accepting nothing from the Gentiles. 8 Therefore we ought to support such people, so that we may prove to be fellow workers with the truth.
9 I wrote something to the church; but Diotrephes, who loves to be first among them, does not accept what we say. 10 For this reason, if I come, I will call attention to his deeds which he does, unjustly accusing us with malicious words; and not satisfied with this, he himself does not receive the brothers either, and he forbids those who want to do so and puts them out of the church.
11 Beloved, do not imitate what is evil, but what is good. The one who does what is good is of God; the one who does what is evil has not seen God. 12 Demetrius has received a good testimony from everyone, and from the truth itself; and we testify too, and you know that our testimony is true.
13 I had many things to write to you, but I do not want to write to you with pen and ink; 14 but I hope to see you shortly, and we will speak face to face.
15 Peace be to you. The friends greet you. Greet the friends by name.
